


First Date Jitters

by Gellsbells



Category: Charmed (TV 2018)
Genre: F/F, F/M, Family Fluff, First Dates, Friendship, Male-Female Friendship, Mel POV, Nervous Harry, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-16
Updated: 2019-06-16
Packaged: 2020-05-12 22:14:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,456
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19238146
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gellsbells/pseuds/Gellsbells
Summary: Harry has finally worked up the courage to ask Macy on a date. However, with Maggie occupied with her sorority, it is Mel he turns to for advice.





	First Date Jitters

Mel wasn’t quite sure how she should react. She supposed that she should feel honoured that their friendship had reached a level where he felt that he could come to her for advice. Just not this particular kind of advice. 

 

“You want to know where to take Macy for your first date?” Mel repeated, her eyes narrowing at Harry still not quite believing the sincerity behind his question. 

 

He gave an earnest nod, before running his hand through his hair, a nervous habit that Mel had beared witness to many times before. Far more often it seemed these days as Harry had started in his own words ‘courting’ her sister. 

 

“Shouldn’t you be talking with Maggie about this?” Mel suggested as she made her way back behind the bar, taking a tray of glasses with her. This was much more Maggie’s domain. She loved involving herself in other people’s business. Always the matchmaker. 

 

She had practically squealed when Macy had admitted to them both her developing feelings for their whitelighter. Mel however was more cautious. She trusted Macy, and despite her misgivings in the past, she now trusted Harry with her life. But there was a worry there that a relationship between the two of them might shift the balance. 

 

“Yes, well, Maggie had sorority business.” Harry sighed. 

 

“So you thought I would be the next best option?”

 

“I don’t have many people I would fee l comfortable to discuss this with. And my tentative internet research has come up with wildly different opinions on first date protocol.”

 

“You have been on dates before, right?” Harry gave a nervous chuckle, his hand returning to his hair. “Right?” Mel returned to lean on the bar examining Harry’s sudden unwillingness to meet her eyes. 

 

“Of course, I have been on a first date.” 

 

Mel raised her eyebrows in response. 

 

“It was just a long time ago. A really long time.” He slumped onto the bar stool, and Mel reached behind the bar, for a bottle and a glass, pouring the amber liquid into the cup in front of him. She had seen that look before, it was pretty much par for the course as a bartender. She felt guilty for bring up his past relationships, especially given how his last one had ended. 

 

“I just don’t want to mess it up, Macy is special and-”

 

“Okay Harry.” Mel stopped him before he launched into another monologue about her sister. The last one had lasted quite a while. It had almost been like he was a nervous schoolboy asking a father’s permission to date his daughter. 

 

“Let’s think about things Macy likes. Like science.” Mel suggested. 

 

“I wouldn’t know the first thing about science, where to even begin.” Mel pulled out her phone, tapping away on the screen, before smiling to herself. Perfect. 

 

She showed the phone to Harry, who pulled his head from his hands to look, a smile spreading across his face and he sat straighter in his stool. 

 

* * *

 

Mel smiled across the table at Niko, still not believing that this was real and not some trick being played on her by a malevolent being. She had given Niko her space, creating the barriers to try and keep them apart, but it seemed fate had had other ideas. 

 

Their paths continuing to cross, until Mel couldn’t keep denying the feelings that remained. Niko had asked her to dinner and that pattern had continued every Saturday evening, until it was a normal part of her routine and that they could go back to how things had been, before she had changed their destinies. 

 

“So what are you feeling like?” Niko asked, as she leafed through the menu again. Mel shrugged her shoulders, flipping from one page to the next, when the phone in her pocket buzzed. She shot an apologetic look to Niko as she glanced to see Harry’s face on the screen. She had taken the quick snap while he was surprised, the look on his face mirroring that, and when he had urged her to delete it she had made it his contact picture much to his chagrin. 

 

“Sorry this could be an emergency,” Mel excused herself from the table moving to a private space in the side alley beside the restaurant. 

 

She accepted the call and put the phone to her ear, “Hey Harry.”

 

“Mel, thank god,” the panic was clear in his tone in addition to his laboured breathing. 

 

“Harry, what’s wrong?” Mel asked, trying to keep her voice level as she moved further down the alley.

 

“It’s ridiculous, I mean it said it was open. Does no one update their Yelp profiles anymore?”

 

“There’s no demon?”

 

“A demon? No.” 

 

“Just you know, I’m kind of out with Niko and I assumed a panicked call from our esteemed advisor and whitelighter would be about some kind of demonic attack, not yelp profiles,” she managed through clenched teeth. 

 

“The planetarium is closed Mel. And dinner is not until 8pm.”

 

“Just go to the restaurant early.”

 

“Mel, please, I have a reservation,” the indignance in his voice was clear and Mel could practically see the disapproving look on his face at her suggestion that he make such a social faux par. 

 

“Wait, where are you?”

 

“Not important.”

 

“Are you hiding in the bathroom?”

 

“No.” The tell tale echo on the other end of the phone told her that was exactly where he was. 

 

“Harry, get out of the bathroom, and have your date with Macy.” 

 

“But,” Harry protested. Mel shook her head, racking her brain for what else might be Macy’s idea of an ideal date. Unless they took a different tact. 

 

“Well why don’t you take her somewhere you enjoy. First dates are about getting to know each other.”

 

“Perhaps.”

 

“Trust me Harry. Take her somewhere you feel at home, loosen up a bit,” Mel stifled a laugh, “just not so much that you break something.”

 

“Very funny, Mel. Okay, wish me luck.” 

 

“Good luck.” Mel hung up the phone, giving a sigh as she rested her head against the brick wall. Hopefully Maggie would finish rush soon and she would be able to hand over managing their whitelighter’s love life to more capable hands as soon as possible. 

 

“Witchy trouble?” Niko asked in a low whisper as Mel returned to her seat.

 

“I wish,” Mel muttered in response, returning to her open menu, still undecided. “Family, Harry troubles.”

 

“Oh,” Niko replied with a smile, “I think it’s nice how close you all are. Considering what you have all been through.” 

 

Niko was right. They were a strong family. One that would change as time moved forward. New members introduced to their inner circle, Parker, even Niko and occasionally even Lucy. It would be weird for a while, Macy and Harry being a ‘thing’ but soon it would become the norm and they would continue to support each other. 

 

“You’re right.”

 

“I know,” Niko replied with a shrug of her shoulders, “Now hurry up and decide what you are having. I’m starving.”

 

* * *

 

Mel stirred from her sleep to the sound of a crash in the hallway, bolting upright, her hand immediately going to the space beside her, a sigh of relief that Niko was still there. And apparently still the world’s deepest sleeper as she didn’t even stir at the next crash into the wall and hushed whispers. 

 

Mel rose out of her bed, slipping on her bracelet as she did so, moving carefully to her door as she opened it slowly, moving through until she entered the hallway. Confronted by her sister and Harry, holding each other up in the shared hallway clearly on their way to Macy’s room. 

 

“Oh Mel,” Macy said in surprise, standing a little straighter as Harry himself mimicked her actions. 

 

“Looks like things went well,” Mel commented, taking in Harry’s slightly disheveled appearance, and the way their arms were wrapped around the other, each swaying gently. 

 

“Very,” Macy smiled brightly, leaning further into Harry, as he attempted to straighten his tie which hung loosely around his neck. “Did you know Harry is quite the karao-” 

 

Harry gave Macy a nudge with his arm, which had Macy slapping her hand over her mouth before giggling into it. Mel laughed herself at Harry’s blush continued to rise up his neck and across his cheeks. 

 

“In any case, we are, um, retiring for the evening.” Macy let out another giggle. 

 

“Okay, I’ll see you both in the morning.” Mel said as she returned to her room shaking her head as the new couple continued to giggle and whisper their way down the hallway. 

 

Mel was quite looking forward to breakfast in the morning and the interesting topic of Harry’s love of karaoke. 

  
  



End file.
